The Play of Shadows
by AsianScaper
Summary: Anakin is confronted by his former master when he attempts to see Amidala. The sequel to 'Tears at Heaven's Gate'. Please read and review!


**Title:** _The Play of Shadows_   
**Author:** al'Laine Aranielle id Larq   
**Disclaimer:** I don't own any of the characters and I'm not making money out of this so please don't sue me. Star Wars, its characters, and everything else in between, belong to George Lucas...I think.   
**Rating:** G   
**Category:** Drama   
**Feedback:** Friends, enemies: Send your comments or constructive criticism to allaine003@hotmail.com. If you find anything remotely displeasing, do tell!   
**Summary:** Anakin is confronted by his former master when he attempts to see Amidala. The sequel to 'Tears at Heaven's Gate'. Please read and review!   
**Spoilers:** None that I know of unless you think Anakin being Darth Vader is a spoiler...   
**Archiving:** =) I'd be honored to have this posted wherever you fellow fans wish. Though, I'd appreciate it very much if you could drop me a line and tell me where it's at.   
**Dedication:** I thank the friends who have prodded me onward. Without them, I would not think of myself as a writer. My gratitude to trin_chardin, madCOW, dreamer18, and krystal. My hopes are with you guys =) Your praise and criticism has been invaluable. This may be the last story I write for Star Wars but perhaps, not the last piece of literature about a universe so convincing. Nonetheless, thank you for your support. This story was written partly for your sake. The inspiration that all of you have given me is perhaps the best gift a writer can have...   
**Author's Note:** I would be very grateful for any insights; if you see any grammatical or spelling errors, feel free to point them out. I'm just starting out =) so it'd be great if you would be generous on your insights. I hope that my exploration on the Anakin/Amidala relationship is appropriate enough and if you think otherwise, please feel free to point out why.

***

The tears that fell from heaven's gate ceased their disturbing ritual once the Queen had escaped her garden. Even as she walked away in a trance of deep sorrow, her steps trod on the marble like a ghost, soft yet terrifying, cold yet alive. Her cries haunted the palace, shrill and unforgiving, as if she were tearing her bodice at the loss of someone who had taken with him a piece of her very soul. And indeed, the man may have, for her wails bounced about the amber in ear splitting constancy and the pillars seem to move with the sway of impending doom. Their light melted with the exit of a most gracious host, the sun.

The bright god's luster shimmered his gold-wrought hands once more to touch the burnished sheen of the palace only to withdraw them as the clouds that had brought the tears wavered and escorted his entourage with a violent wave of thunder.

Those who listened to her hid beneath the shadows, aware of the beast that threatened to engulf all of them with the swipe of his wretched hand. They knew that the vile disease ailing her would entrap them in a shell, alone with that same beast that drew pain and sorrow from the being within. But they listened nonetheless and lent her their sympathy, only to be rejected with tear stained cheeks and a face so beautifully rent that they mourned the loss of her happiness. 

Howling in fervent breathes, the wind was fated to brush at her face as her only comfort and it caressed her cheek, wiping her face with surreptitiousness that even she did not notice her tears dry as they fell unbidden from her eyes. And though it swung about with the steps of an avid dancer, it sang as well. It sang the rage and woe that breathed from the depths of a broken heart. And once more, the Queen buried her face into her sheets and dared the wind to dry the deluge of a salt-stained sea. It heard her cry and ceased to be, only to be replaced by a soft relentless breeze that threatened to send anyone who glanced its way down the path of grief. And indeed, it provided a small comfort to her whose skin was no longer a defense to the elements of miserly Time.

The air grew heavy with tears unshed and it alighted as an opaque breath onto the cloak of a man who walked in that way he had, with pure trust upon his senses. His tallness vied to encompass all the silent phantoms that touched his robe and their hands whose palms sweated at the ominous vileness of him, withdrew almost quickly, avoiding the touch of corruption. The light of his torch flashed his shadow against the framework of resin and it danced amongst the company of darkness. The torches that lit the halls missed their marks, afraid of him, sending ghosts wailing at his wake. These servants of Neptune's realm marveled at him and stretched their ebony paws about the offing, trying to determine if he belonged to what remained of them. To their surprise, unliving as they were, his footsteps echoed like that of the animated yet whispered the words of an elegy.

Then, as he sauntered with steps of profound silence, he paused to listen at a memory as it enticed him to pay homage to its harp. The reminiscence played its fingers about the strings, the music emanating from it so harsh and melancholic that he was sucked into another world, another time.

_There had been a certain age, and to him it had seemed like millenia, that he could not remember a time when the laughter of a Queen and that of her lowly companion did not light the halls with what he now lacked. Their faces were a mirror to a universe with a beginning and an end, like stars at the brink of creation wherein even the certainty of life was obscured..._

He shook his head in regret and walked onward, a hooded menace traipsing amongst the work of angels.

"Ho stranger, what brings you here?" a voice queried from beyond the ghosts and the darkness that illuminated the man's path. In the great silence and the cackling of torch fire, the shades of iniquity had swept their ebony hands around the palace in a mantle of gloom. 

The man swirled to the voice's direction, his cloak blacker than any night, it's sheath the glint of death's sickle. "Who goes there?" he demanded. The tone settled with a ring of steel. So cold and unforgiving that the lurking stranger behind the pillars had his brow furrowed in contempt. The mist about him followed the movement of his hands and he looked like the clouds of a storm at the verge of a violent creation.

_A harbinger of ill will...that voice!_ Obi-wan thought. Hiding in the shadows like a thief in the night, he watched as the cloaked figure spun up and about, searching for the voice that was the source of his anxiety.

"The answer...the answer depends entirely on you. Who are you and why are you here?" The Jedi Knight could not suppress a chuckle laced with irony. "Yes," he hissed, mockery a strong note in that oddly suffocated chamber. "I wonder, what brings you here you spawn of darkness?"

It seemed as if the man's eyes had widened. "Obi-wan?"

And the innocence that had hidden in a blanket of rejection returned in seeming swiftness. It lighted his eyes and it sprung forth to cover what remained of him. That dark garment that belied his present state seemed to shrink in its obscurity. The boy, for truly that was what he was, sobbed softly.

_ No, it could not be...the desert boy...Anakin?_ Suddenly hushed at the memories that swept past his eyes, he stepped forward to the circle of light created by the boy's torch but Anakin, his breadth and height disclosing his true self, could only raise a hand to stop Obi-wan from approaching.

"Do not come nearer, Master. I am, after all, all that you have claimed me to be..." The boy clenched a fist and Obi-wan could envision those empty wells fill in with the flood of a thousand regrets. He was a strange figure, the boy. He stood like a man, with the visage of one and with the inflection of discarded youth, and yet deep within, beyond the façade, was a boy so innocent that within the vicinity of a committed flaw, he shed tears almost immediately. 

"You have the stench of a Servant, stranger. They told me you would never return...and indeed you have not. Empty words come with empty promises…Padawan..." Obi-wan whispered hoarsely. _I have been too proud and naïve...too young to accept my limitations. Look, just look, at what I have done to this child. We are lost...dear gods above, we are lost!_

"Indeed...," Anakin said, as the realization dawned on him, just as the plague of insects engulfs a field with their hunger and leaves it bare as the deserts of a planet scorched by a treacherous sun. His look glazed over with seeming madness, his eyes focused entirely on his hands. And the boy wrung them in disbelief and approaching aberration. "What man stands and lives, not like a creature of the earth and yet walks on it?" he queried, dubious at the reality of all that stood his way. "Master...?"

"Anger is a way to the Dark Side," Obi-wan murmured, uttering words that had once, not long before, been told to him in great fervor and austerity. He only wished that the spawn of darkness before him would understand the wisdom beneath it. "Beware of it lest you embrace it... Control your anger AND your fear, only then will you master the true you and the self that submits to all that come your way."

"I am not lost Obi-wan. Not yet, not now..."

And suddenly, thoughts filled Anakin's head...the thoughts that had invaded his senses when all else had failed... He collapsed on his knees as poor memory scratched its claws against his mind.

*

_A wind that had been liberated by that coat of life called the sea brushed past the leaves of distant trees fathered by the warmth of earth and water. And a man, seated at the edge of a meadow, stared beyond the breaths that stroked his brow. He breathed heavily, as if a burden had been settled upon his back but it was not the air that quickened the work of his lungs; it was the very thought of a woman, not so far across the galaxy, that threatened to wrench tears from his eyes._

As blood spilled from his side like wine from the rim of a chalice, his thoughts were elsewhere, beyond the pain that made him think of a terrible god hovering about, awaiting surrender from its most vulnerable prey. He denied the lashing of Neptune's seas, their tides engulfing hope, but pushing back nonetheless as the thought of one woman- one woman! - brought back the silent wall of reassurance. Once again, the wind howled, taking with it the song of his soul, the chant of a thousand voices to make known an ardor he knew would never reach her ears.

Anakin was too tired to argue, too impaled in the spears of sorrow to care. The silence stretched. It stretched for millennia, from one end of time's thread to the other, from the very distance of space that they had crossed. Memories seemed to flash before his eyes. 

Bowing his head, ignoring the lights that scorched the sky as another battle came into phase, a soft tear caressed the side of his face and he was unable to suppress a shudder. He found himself weeping softly, the flood of a thousand seasons mingling with those of a love unseen even to him.

Finally, his gaze wavered in the light of the setting sun and his face twisted in silent understanding...

*

Mentor and pupil stood feet from each other, the bond that held them fast suddenly severed by a strange hand. By the looks each gave each other, one was ready to draw his weapon while the other was ready to die but to seek the truth beneath their masks, each was looking for a way to escape a reality that had dawned upon their heads. And yet, a world that had been buried long before in a fight filled with the cries of death, had now risen from the earth, and once more, the wishes of a palace's inhabitants were fulfilled. And before they knew the consequences to such an outcome, the Queen had bathed it with light that flowed from the extent of their very souls.

As stars stood like beholders in a sky cluttered with invaders, their light stood faithful as they gave a man hopes for a future and reassured him, that despite the strange fires that heralded sudden deaths, there was a certain joy in its wake. War had been something to deepen the orifice between space and time. Love was what filled the gap to its boundaries.

***

**-The End-**


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